December's video releases include at least eight sequels, or franchises, or rehashes, or whatever. Among them are the animated “Despicable Me 2,” which applies hip jokes to stylish design, and “The Wolverine,” which applies quite a bit of metal to Hugh Jackman.

Other expensively designed movies include Neill Blomkamp's “Elysium” (it's 2154 and Matt Damon still doesn't have health care) and Gore Verbinski's “The Lone Ranger” (Johnny Depp gets top billing as Tonto). Smaller movies also use visual effects, as seen in the following.

An awkward teen talks with his creepily puppeted teddy bear while treading minefields of desire in “Animals,” a Spanish oddity that doesn't resemble “Ted.” The bear announces the theme by saying he likes stories where people die for what they love, and the whole movie plays with the lures of sex and death.

Dying for love is also a theme in Alain Resnais' ultra-civilized “You Ain't Seen Nothin' Yet,” as a group of actors gathers at a dead friend's home to watch a film of his new staging of Orpheus and Eurydice. They begin playing the roles as layers of reality mingle into a fantasy of art and life.

Set in 1953 Iran during the Shah's U.S.-supported coup against President Mossadegh, Shirin Neshat's “Women Without Men” follows four women trapped by sexist culture. Based on the novel by Shahrnush Parsipur (who appears as a brothel madam), it mixes realism with symbolic fantasy (such as a woman who rises from death) and the type of lovely imagery that's made Neshat a video star in the art world.

Hallucinations are the quest of Sebastian Silva's playful, observant “Crystal Fairy & the Magical Cactus,” in which obnoxious tourist Michael Cera and an intensely inappropriate American waif (Gaby Hoffman) travel with three brothers in search of a mescaline high via cactus. Like all road trips, they find themselves, and it might be too much to handle.

Another intensely observed waif is the center of Noah Baumbach's “Frances Ha,” co-written by star Greta Gerwig. It's a montage of moments in which she struggles with poverty, friendship, and ambition in New York. Shot on digital video treated to look like high-contrast black and white, this is like an episode of “Girls” that evokes the French New Wave and is more sweet than sour.

Ever since “The Artist,” it's an era for the return of black-and-white and even silent film. The Japanese “Sanguivorous” is an avant-garde vampire-woman movie whose elliptical tale is mostly told in that manner with splashes of sound and color.

You can compare it with its obvious inspiration thanks to Kino's Blu-Ray of the 1922 “Nosferatu,” on two discs with a making-of and clips from other Murnau items. Kino also issues the Blu-ray of “Russian Ark,” a monumental achievement shot in one complex, ravishing 100-minute digital take that crosses space and time.

Criterion has begun issuing DVD/Blu-ray dual editions (instead of separate formats), and unlike many labels that load extras onto the Blu and skimp the DVD, this classy outfit puts everything on both.

They're starting with three stone-brilliant essentials that pretty much summarize the splendor of cinema: Charles Chaplin's “City Lights,” Yasujiro Ozu's “Tokyo Story” and Robert Altman's 'Nashville,” all packed with comments and extras. If you haven't seen these, move heaven and earth to correct that oversight.

Criterion also offers the disc debut of Elio Petri's brilliant mix of crime and politics, “Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspicion.” A police chief commits a chic murder and waits to get caught as the system avoids him. It's a sleek, modern inversion of Kafka, with Ennio Morricone's bouncy music for a nervous breakdown.